16-Year-Old Transgender Sues School Over Restroom Policy

A Virginia 16-year-old has filed a federal lawsuit against the Gloucester County school district, with the American Civil Liberties Union’s help, demanding he be allowed to use the boys restroom even though he was born female.

Gavin Grimm has been diagnosed with gender dysphoria, or gender identity disorder, which is the formal diagnosis used by psychologists and physicians to describe people who are discontent with the gender they were assigned at birth.

Grimm is seeking a court order that requires the school board to let Grimm use the boys’ restroom, despite being born female.

(Image source: Gavin Grimm/Facebook)

Last October, school officials agreed to let Grimm use the boys’ restrooms at Gloucester High School, which Grimm did for about seven weeks without incident, the lawsuit says.

But in December, the school board voted to require transgender students to use the restroom that coordinates with their physical sex or private single-stall bathrooms.

The 16-year-old sophomore is suing the school board in federal court and charging it with sex discrimination.

“As a result of the School Board’s transgender restroom policy, Gavin is currently the only student in his school who must use separate private restrooms,” the ACLU lawsuit claims.

“The distinction stigmatizes Gavin and marks him as different from the other students; it isolates Gavin from his peers; and it exposes him to serious psychological harm. To avoid the stigma of having to use separate restrooms, Gavin has tried to avoid using any restroom during the school day,” the lawsuit added.

Washington Blade reported that Grimm must use a unisex bathroom in the Gloucester High School nurse’s office.

“I just want to use the restroom in peace,” said Grimm in an ACLU press release. “Since the school board passed this policy, I feel singled out and humiliated every time I need to use the restroom.”

The majority of the three dozen county residents who spoke at the meeting objected to Grimm’s use of boys bathrooms, saying that to do so violated the privacy of other students.

A CBS News poll taken in 2014 shows that 59% of Americans believe people should use the restroom based off of what gender they were assigned at birth.

At an earlier school board session, some county residents complained that allowing transgender students to use bathrooms that matched their gender identity would lead to sexual assaults and encourage boys to cross-dress in order to get into girls’ bathrooms for salacious purposes.